Think meditation is hard?
Do me a favor.
Take a slow,
Deep breath in.
And now breathe out.
Congratulations.
You just meditated.
Hi,
I'm Crystal Joukowsky,
And this is Breathe In,
Breathe Out,
A weekly mindfulness and meditation podcast for anyone ready to own their own shit and find a little peace while doing it.
Hello and welcome back to Breathe In,
Breathe Out.
I'm your host,
Crystal Joukowsky.
It is late April and it's amazing.
The sun is out,
The birds are singing,
Everything's warming up,
It's all greening up.
It is just,
It's gorgeous.
I mean,
This is just amazing.
And this is when you like,
This is the point in time when I'll leave my house and I'll walk out the door and I'll realize that my windows might be just a little bit dirty from the winter and I need to get them cleaned because things aren't quite as bright from the inside of my house as they are outside when I step into that sun.
And it's so amazing and beautiful and such a gift.
Spring is amazing.
And I totally understand why people call it spring cleaning because there's this thing about winter is being shrugged off your shoulders and you just want to air everything out and feel that freedom and the hope and the joy.
And yet spring cleaning can be such a challenge and so overwhelming.
When was the last time you went through your email?
Like when was the last time you really went through your email?
There was a time I looked at my email because my browser or my,
You know,
I'm not a tech person.
It warned me that my data,
Like my memory was almost full.
I was going to have to start buying memory if I didn't do something.
And so I looked at my email and I found out that I had over 900 emails and that was just the unread ones.
900 emails that were just being stored and hanging out there for dear life or you know,
Just all of eternity.
And spring cleaning is a lot like my email was because there are things that we keep.
There are things that we keep because we want to.
There's this special connection to it.
It is an absolute gift and you want to cherish it or there's a purpose for that item.
You need to remember something.
Maybe it's the letters or in my case emails,
But there's something attached to that that you need to know,
You need to keep it available just in case.
It's almost like this insurance policy for some things and then this positive,
Joyful memory on other things and then just kind of a neutral ground for others.
And in my email there was a reason,
Like I had so many things going back so far and I started cleaning them out.
But when I was cleaning them out,
I was reading them and when I read them,
Then I would go through all of this emotional angst and upset and frustration that was tied up in whatever that email subject was.
There was a time I needed to keep it.
There's a time I needed to remember that heartache.
Why did I need it now?
Why did I need to keep it now?
Why do I need to hold onto it?
Is it causing me joy?
Is it bringing more light into my life?
Is it lightening my burden in any way,
Shape or form?
And the answer for majority of these emails was no,
These aren't enhancing my life in a positive manner in any way,
Shape or form.
Why am I holding onto them?
And eventually I stopped reading them and started just delete,
Delete,
Delete,
Delete and got rid of so many of them.
I was so proud.
It was multiple hours.
It took a long time.
When we go to do spring cleaning in our homes,
It's the same thing.
We have all these things that we've kind of squirreled away.
You know,
Squirrels bring all of those nuts in because they need to survive through the winter.
So we have surround ourselves with all of these things and some of them bring us joy through the winter and they help us survive through the winter.
And then some of them at the end of the winter,
It's like,
Why?
I don't necessarily need this anymore.
So what can I do?
How can I make it better?
What can I let go of?
And it can be so overwhelming because it is this tangible thing in front of you.
And while you hold it,
You can feel the emotion,
The love,
The joy,
The heartache,
The pain coming with that item that you're thinking about spring cleaning.
It's not easy.
It's overwhelming.
It takes a lot of time.
Sometimes it's better to do it with a friend.
If you have a friend that loves to clean,
I highly encourage you to call them up and say,
Hey,
I really want to spring clean right now.
And I don't know how to do it because I will just go into this pit of memories and I'll never come out of it.
So having a friend come over and saying,
You know,
I just,
I just want to clean it up.
I want to open it up.
I want to clear it out.
And it's going to feel so much better when you do.
So in the interest of removing those weights and burdens,
Whether we're talking about physical things that spring cleaning need to get rid of or emotional things,
Mental things that we need to get rid of,
I keep telling you,
I mean it when I say it,
Which is why repetition is so powerful.
Go with the little steps.
When you're cleaning out,
Do like three bins and you have one bin that is everything that's just going to be trashed.
You don't need it.
It's just a piece of paper.
It's just a magazine.
It's just this or that.
I don't need that.
That can go in the trash.
And you have another bin.
That's a,
I need to keep this because I need it for my heart.
And then you'll have another bin.
And this other bin is going to be the let's revisit that later.
Now when you do it this way,
One,
Two,
Three,
It helps you go through things a lot faster because you don't have to decide that you're going to donate or throw away this thing right now.
You can put it in the revisit pile and there are some things you just know that you want to keep.
And there are some things that you know,
You just want to get rid of just doing one quick pass,
Say I'm going to give myself an hour in this room and I'm just going to go through it.
You'll be surprised at how much better you feel just getting rid of the few things that go to the trash or donation.
And you will revisit the other stuff later,
That box in the middle that says I got to revisit it.
And you might be surprised at how many of them that you just need to hold by your heart and say thank you for that moment.
And then you're ready to let go of that too.
Emotionally,
There are things that we carry all the time.
There are those interactions we have that leave us questioning ourselves.
There's the upset words that we exchanged with someone or there's that moment of joy that lives in your heart and makes you just laugh thinking about it in this moment and you just can't help but smile.
If you've still got those heavy ones,
If you've still got the ones that say,
Hey,
This doesn't feel good and I really want to let go,
Or this is really weighing me down more than I want to keep carrying,
I encourage you to find a way to spring clean it out.
You might write it down.
You could maybe even type it up.
Maybe you want to get it out and then burn it so that you can absolutely release it.
Perhaps you feel strong enough that you can have a conversation with someone and say,
You know,
This happened between us and I'm still struggling and I just wanted to let you know that it's something there for me and I want to heal it because I want to feel better.
I really hope that you take stock.
See where you can let go of some of the old crap and maybe find some new sunshine.
It could be in the back of that hard drive when you just start getting rid of all that old crap or it might be something in plain sight right here where you can let it go there too.
Either way,
I promise you that letting it go and spring cleaning will feel even better and you will be so much more ready for this fabulous new spring that is just waiting for you to dig in and enjoy.
I hope this moment of self-care and healing brought you some hope and peace.
I'm Crystal Dzachowski on Instagram,
Facebook,
And YouTube,
And I hope you check us out and follow along for more content coming soon.
I look forward to being with you again here on Breathe In,
Breathe Out.
Until next time,
Take care.
